All the Beirut news.

During a brief visit to New Haven a few weeks ago I took a walk in the Grove Street cemetery, established in 1797. Here are some photographs of things that caught my eye that day - Egyptian revival railings, a torn, worn American flag, weathered angels, and a Birch trunk scratched up by squirrels.

Les palestiniens refusent que Aïn El Héloué puisse menacer la sécurité du Liban  (L’Orient- Le Jour du 20/11/08). Toz! Je ne les crois pas, les palestiniens sont pires que les libanais, ils sont incapables de gouverner des réduits d’un Km2 nommés pudiquement “les camps” et leur maladresse d’il y a quatre décennies avait déstabilisé notre pays pour [...]

I am off to London for 16 days. Therefore, I may be silent over here. I somehow have been for a while now. I went from posting every 2 days for over 2 months back to posting once every week now. It's like I drained myself out over here for the previous months and all of a sudden, allow me to borrow this statement, I have nothing to say.

It’s another effort by a Western power to draw Syria out of its international isolation in hopes Damascus would loosen its strong ties with Tehran and groups such as Hezbollah and some Palestinian factions.

The U.K.’s Foreign Minister, David Miliband, made a landmark visit to Damascus on Tuesday. He's the first British top diplomat to visit Damascus since 2001.

Before heading to Beirut, Miliband said that Syria had an "essential role" to play in the stability of the Middle East. This move might be seen as a sign that the U.K., after France, is warming up to the Syrians.

Yesterday MESH (the Middle East Strategy at Harvard blog) had what seemed to be a delightfully time-wasting post on online quizzes about the Middle East.
I didn’t find any time to waste yesterday, but while stuck on a phone call this afternoon, I decided to try my hand at two geography quizzes aimed at testing my [...]

[ Wednesday, 26 November, 2008; ]

On Friday the 14th of November, Sheikh Nadim Gemayel announced unofficially the start of his
electoral campaign, reassuring everyone that he is running for the upcoming 2009 elections.

Even though i thought it was too early for him to run for elections, but i believe it is a courageous move and a decisive one for him. Compared [...]

A leaked version of the IAEA's report on Syria appeared on the ISIS site today. While it doesn't say conclusively that Syria was building a reactor, it doesn't look good.
Three issues immediately stand out:

March 14???s call on the Arab League to form a ???fact-finding
mission??? to investigate the Fateh al-Islam group will likely increase the
dandruff population, since many inside and outside of Lebanon will be furiously
scratching their heads in wonder over the futility of such a move.  The Syrian media stunt had left many in
the failed independence movement angry at the regime???s insolence in making up
facts and airing them so blatantly. How dare they accuse the free Lebanese of conspiring to kill their own?
This at a time the Lebanese and their counterparts in the UN have been
investigating for years now!

This organisation is a shame the Islamic world would have to bear for a long time. Their speech is full of manipulation, hate, and bigotry. And no, Islam and Muslims are not like this bunch. In fact, I think that Al-Qaida is responsible for the anti-Muslim wave across the western world, for Guantanamo, for Iraq, for Abu-Ghraib, and for what is happening to the peace process in Palestine, as

An Egyptian court has ordered a freeze in exporting the country's natural gas to Israel, stating that the 15-year deal with the Jewish state should be approved by parliament.

I really need to blog in full this short article from IRIN. But note the section in bold and compare it with my previous post on Lebanese Bedouins, especially the section where my co-researcher says:

Yesterday, all branches of the Lebanese University (public), private and public schools, professional and technical schools, as well as the general administration participated in a teachers’ strike. About 100,000 teachers educating 1 million students. The strike was accompanied by a well-attended sit-in in front of parliament. Press coverage was mostly pathetic, consisting of a few [...]

"The 2008 meeting should "should lay the ground for a new system of agricultural trade that offers farmers, in developed and developing countries alike, the means of earning a decent living," Diouf said.The summit would also aim to set up an "emergency intervention fund" to help farmers in vulnerable countries rapidly increase output when commodity market spikes hit food import bills. Rising prices early this year plunged millions of people into hunger and sparked food riots around the world." (Thanks D.)
FAO finally wakes up